The Obama White House kept tabs on a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for information on former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s email accounts that the State Department improperly denied, according to newly released emails.

The emails, which were provided to Judicial Watch, show for the first time that the Obama White House was aware of the Clinton-related FOIA request, which the liberal watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) submitted to the State Department in December 2012.

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The State Department denied the request in May 2013, claiming that no responsive records existed. That despite officials at the State Department, the White House and even President Obama himself knowing that Clinton used a personal email account for government business.

Judicial Watch's Tom Fitton's theory on the White House's interest:

“These documents suggest the Obama White House knew about the Clinton email lies being told to the public at least as early as December 2012,” he said in a statement.

The report indicates that if the FOIA request would have been fulfilled the public would have known of Clinton's impropriety earlier than 2015.

Clinton denied using the private email server for classified information but a subsequent investigation determined that was a lie. James Comey even stated that Clinton's use of the server was "extremely careless."